Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne announced today that Madison police officer Matt Kenny will not be charged for shooting and killing unarmed biracial teenager Tony Robinson in March.

From CNN:

“I conclude that this tragic and unfortunate death was the result of a lawful use of deadly police force and that no charges should be brought against Officer Kenny in the death of Tony Robinson Jr.,” he said.

“My decision will not bring Tony Robinson Jr. back,” Ozanne told reporters. “My decision will not end the racial disparities that exist in the justice system, in our justice system. My decision is not based on emotion. Rather, this decision is based on the facts as they have been investigated and reported to me.”

Robinson was killed on March 6, after police were called to a Madison apartment because of reports that Robinson had assaulted two people and was running in and out of traffic. There was apparently some sort of confrontation between Kenny, who is white, and Robinson. Police allege Kenny suffered a concussion during a scuffle while Robinson’s friends claim the teen had taken hallucinogenic mushrooms earlier that day and was not an actual threat to the officer. Robinson also reportedly suffered from attention deficit disorder, anxiety, and depression.

Image via AP. Contact the author at taylor@gawker.com.

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Who should save the sight of an uninsured South Carolina man who can’t afford eye surgery? That’s the question the Charlotte Observer asks in a story about a 49-year-old Republican who declined to sign up for Obamacare because he “prided himself on paying his own medical bills,” and is now upset that the Affordable Care Act won’t bail him out.

Luis Lang, a self-employed handyman from Fort Mill whose clients include the federal government, told the Observer he “knew the act required him to get coverage but he chose not to do so. But he thought help would be available in an emergency,” like the mini-strokes and deteriorating vision he suffered in February.

It’s not available though, because that’s not how insurance works. Insurance companies are profitable because they take your money before you incur major medical expenses, not because they save new customers’ eyes for free. It’s almost like the needs of the market aren’t aligned with the needs of actual human beings, as if the American healthcare system encourages people to gamble that they’ll stay healthy instead of getting insurance, and forces society to bear the costs when the house wins (which is always).

If only there were some way to make people get insurance, and maybe even help them pay for it to save all of us money in the long run.

Nahhh, that’s crazy.

Anyway, Lang is now stuck in a position where, suddenly having come around on this whole insurance thing with the impending loss of his eyesight, it’s too late for him to sign up under what his wife calls “The Not Fair Health Care Act.” Furthermore, his income has dropped now that he’s out of work, making him ineligible for a federal insurance subsidy. (What about Medicaid, you ask? Well, South Carolina was one of 17 states that opted out of the ACA’s Medicaid expansion.)

For now, Lang’s doctor, Malcolm Edwards, will keep treating him for free, but he doesn’t have the expertise to do the surgery Lang needs. And he can’t force his patient to take care of himself.

“There’s a lot of talk about personal responsibility in health care reform,” the Observer observes, “so it’s probably fair to note that Lang is a smoker who has, by his own account, been inconsistent in his efforts to control his diabetes.”

Cool.

Lang has set up a GoFundMe page, and people are donating—because even though it’s insane to blame Obamacare, the system really is fucked up—but they’re also chastising him for being “a poster child for what you claim to be against” and “voting against [your] own self-interest.”

[H/T Wonkette, Photo: GoFundMe]

One of the Toronto soccer bros chewed out on camera by a reporter for pulling the tired “Fuck Her Right in the Pussy” gag has been fired from his $100,000-a-year job. Fucked himself right in the paycheck.

A 34-year-old man who killed his stepfather giving him a so-called “atomic wedgie” last year is going to jail for involuntary manslaughter—and that’s the silver lining.

Brad Lee Davis killed his stepfather last January when he managed to suffocate him inside his own underwear while performing the wedgie. Davis just pleaded guilty to the charges, but it reportedly could have been much worse for him—prosecutors originally tried to pursue first-degree murder charges.

Although there was some (scant) evidence to support the necessary intent—Davis and his stepfather reportedly had a contentious relationship and he “texted a friend that night he was fixing to mess Denver up and later texted he had nothing to lose”—he eventually pleaded out before trial.

But even with the deal, Davis will likely to spend some real time in prison: prosecutors tell News OK they’re asking for a 35-year sentence—well over the four-year minimum for involuntary manslaughter convictions in Oklahoma.

Contact the author at gabrielle@gawker.com.

Several prominent reporters are coming forward to back portions of the explosive new Seymour Hersh account of Osama bin Laden’s killing.

The story, published this weekend, was generally denied by the White House and derided by others as an “unsubstantiated conspiracy theory.”

But now other reporters are coming forward to confirm portions of the report—critics included: national security blogger R.J. Hillhouse, who published similar allegations in 2011, is now accusing Hersh of plagiarism.

And Carlotta Gall, a New York Times correspondent based in Afghanistan, writes today in the Times that she too encountered evidence to support one claim made by Hersh—that Pakistan had been hiding bin Laden in Abbottabad all along:

Two years later, when I was researching my book, I learned from a high-level member of the Pakistani intelligence service that the ISI had been hiding Bin Laden and ran a desk specifically to handle him as an intelligence asset. After the book came out, I learned more: that it was indeed a Pakistani Army brigadier — all the senior officers of the ISI are in the military — who told the C.I.A. where Bin Laden was hiding, and that Bin Laden was living there with the knowledge and protection of the ISI.

I trusted my source — I did not speak with him, and his information came to me through a friend, but he was high enough in the intelligence apparatus to know what he was talking about. I was confident the information was true, but I held off publishing it. It was going to be extremely 10,356-worddifficult to corroborate in the United States, not least because the informant was presumably in witness protection.

Over at NBC, a group of reporters say three high-level sources confirmed the same claim.

The NBC News sources who confirm that a former Pakistani military intelligence official became a U.S. intelligence asset include a special operations officer and a CIA officer who had served in Pakistan. These two sources and a third source, a very senior former U.S. intelligence official, also say that elements of the ISI were aware of bin Laden’s presence in Abbottabad. The former official was emphatic about the ISI’s awareness, saying twice, “They knew.”

Also addressed was Hersh’s claim that it was a former Pakistani military snitch looking for a reward—and not the clever tracking of a bin Laden courier—that led the U.S. to Abbottabad. Although NBC walked back a report (in a newly appended editor’s note) appearing to support this, Gall points out the claim is gaining traction elsewhere.

Finally, the Pakistani daily newspaper The News reported Tuesday that Pakistani intelligence officials have conceded that it was indeed a walk-in who provided the information on Bin Laden. The newspaper names the officer as Brigadier Usman Khalid; the reporter is sufficiently well connected that he should be taken seriously.

So far, the official response—essentially that the 10,356-word piece has “too many inaccuracies to detail”—hasn’t touched on these allegations. But national security officials have addressed other specifics, explicitly denying Monday that Pakistan was involved in the raid, which Pentagon spokesman Col. Steve Warren deemed a “unilateral U.S. mission.”

Image via AP. Contact the author at gabrielle@gawker.com.

According to WCAU, at around 9:20 p.m. on Tuesday, an Amtrak train derailed eight to 10 of its cars in Philadelphia’s Frankford neighborhood. Officials say at least five were killed and around 50 more were injured when the train carrying approximately 243 people crashed.

WPVI-TV reports that several ambulances have been dispatched to the scene of the crash, which has been categorized as a third-alarm incident due to the number of rescue personnel involved.

Former Pennsylvania congressman Patrick J. Murphy tweets he was on the train during the crash and has shared photos showing a bloody, chaotic scene.

@Amtrak @msnbc @NBCNews pray for these passengers. pic.twitter.com/mksZNy7eqo

May 13, 2015

pic.twitter.com/GvooK8lq58

May 13, 2015

UPDATE 10:30 p.m.: Passengers have uploaded additional images of the scene immediately following the derailment to social media.

Was just on #Amtrak train that crashed pic.twitter.com/NSGh1ZfW1o

May 13, 2015

UPDATE 10:40 p.m.: NBC Nightly News producer Janelle Richards, who was on the train, gave WCAU a frightening first-hand account of the crash:

According to Richards, the train was supposed to arrive in New York at 10:30 p.m. Around 9:20 p.m. Richards heard a loud crash and people flew up in the air.

Richards says there was a lot of “jerking back and forth” and “a lot of smoke.” Richards also says she saw injured passengers who were bleeding.

UPDATE 11:45 p.m.: Amtrak has set up a toll-free hotline for friends and family of passengers that were on the train: 1-800-523-9101

UPDATE 11:50 p.m.: At a press conference Tuesday night, Mayor Michael Nutter confirmed that five people have died.

“This was an absolute disastrous mess,” said Nutter. “I have never seen anything like it in my life.”

UPDATE 12:25 a.m.: The NTSB, which investigates transportation accidents in the U.S., says it has dispatched a “go-team” that will arrive at the site of the crash Wednesday morning.

The Washington Post reports that while the cause of the derailment is not currently known, “it apparently occurred as the train entered a curve.”

UPDATE 05/13/15 7:45 a.m.: Amtrak has confirmed to the New York Times that Northeast Regional Train 188 was carrying 238 passengers; six died in the crash. “It is an absolute disastrous mess,” Philadelphia mayor Michael A. Nutter told the paper. “I have never seen anything like this in my life.”

[Image via WCAU/Twitter]

Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser has been on record stating that she believes the Washington Redskins should change their name. Lately, however, she’s gone back to saying “Redskins” while talking about the team in public, and it might be because she’s trying to curry favor with team owner Dan Snyder.

Bowser is currently trying to convince the Skins, who play their games in Landover, Md., to return to D.C. While talking about her attempts to woo the team at a recent press conference, she used the word “Redskins” a few times, and was then called out on it by a reporter (via the Washington Post):

Reporter: Why do you think the name should be changed?

Bowser: It’s offensive to many people.

Reporter: Then why do you continue to use it?

Bowser: I don’t.

Reporter: You just did.

Bowser: I may have slipped and used it.

But according to NBC Washington’s Mark Segraves, the real reason for the word’s sudden return to Bowser’s vocabulary isn’t so innocent:

Sources say DC @MayorBowser has been advised to use @Redskins name in public as sign of good faith to team owner Dan Snyder.

May 11, 2015

Segraves’s sources include “a senior Bowser administration official.”

What’s sad is that this kind of ego-stroking is probably exactly the kind of thing that would help convince Dan Snyder to move his team. What’s even sadder is that Bowser is doing this for nothing more than a shot at setting her constituents up to be dicked out of hundreds of millions of dollars in the usual stadium scam.

[WaPo]

Quick math problem: Lindsay Lohan has 17 days (not counting weekends) to do 115 hours of community service or she goes back to jail. Lindsay does 0 hours on Monday and 0 hours on Tuesday. How fucked is she?

According to the Daily News, very.

Lohan, who has lived in London since late last year to perform in the David Mamet play “Speed the Plow,” landed in New York Tuesday afternoon, forcing school officials at Duffield Children’s Center in Fort Greene to fumble for excuses to explain the star’s absence on her first day of class.

The tardiness left a source familiar with Lohan’s predicament “speechless,” especially considering the actress claimed she was “home in nyc” in social media posts Monday—even though she was most likely still in London.

She’s expected to begin Wednesday in the way one might also expect that check you’ve been waiting for to get dropped off today. Who knows! It could happen!

Current hours tally: holding steady at “almost 10”/125

Image via AP. Contact the author at gabrielle@gawker.com.

If you happen to see a wild bear, police in North Adams, Massachusetts have a sensible—if weirdly specific—recommendation: “Chasing bears through the woods drunk with a dull hatchet is strongly not advised.”

“Yes that really did happen tonight,” explained the North Adams Police Department in a post on social media Monday. From Facebook:

The hatchet man was taken into protective custody due to his incapacitation from the consumption of alcoholic beverage. We are still trying to figure out what his end game was. Any thoughts on what he was going to do if he did locate it? We would certainly like to hear because we have no idea.

In lieu of drunken hatchet chases, police suggest a much more reasonable (and significantly less fun-sounding) course of action.

“If you see a bear, LEAVE IT ALONE and call us,” wrote the department’s unnamed, exasperated spokesperson. “We certainly don’t need anyone going all Davy Crockett chasing it through the woods drunk with a dull hatchet.”

North Adams Police have yet to make a statement regarding urban, sober or better-sharpened bear chases.

[Image via Shutterstock]

Welcome to Loser Sons of Politics, a new column where members of the Jezebel staff recall with fondness the antics of the loser sons of politicians. Today: William Paul, son of Senator Rand Paul, who has pled guilty to DUI. This is the 22-year-old’s third alcohol-related run-in in as many years.

According to WKYT, the young Paul pled guilty to DUI on Tuesday. Additional charges—that he’d also failed to maintain insurance coverage—were dropped. Paul’s punishment includes 45 days of license suspension and alcohol education. He is also required to pay $718 in fines. Once those stipulations are met, he’ll be back on the road. Look out, Kentucky!

Paul has faced alcohol-related charges in the past. In 2013, He was charged with assaulting a flight attendant and consuming alcohol while underage. Those charges were dropped. Later that year, Kentucky’s Alcoholic Beverage Control cited him for alcohol possession of a minor at Keeneland.

Police classified this as an aggravated DUI charge because they say Paul refused an alcohol test. Neither Paul, nor his father has commented.

Normally, we wouldn’t give a shit about what some guy’s kid did. But the game changes when the father of the loser has built a career on dispensing advice for how other fathers should father their own offspring. Rand Paul isn’t the sort of politician who touts his status as a family man as somehow qualifying him for elected office like, say, a Huckabee or a Palin, but he solidified his son’s place on the Loser Sons pantheon during an interview with conservative talk show host Laura Ingraham that occurred during recent unrest in Baltimore.

“I came through the train on Baltimore (sic) last night, I’m glad the train didn’t stop,” he said, laughing, during an interview with conservative radio host Laura Ingraham.

Railing against what he repeatedly called “thuggery and thievery” in the streets of Baltimore, Paul told Ingraham that talking about “root causes” was not appropriate in the middle of a riot.

“The police have to do what they have to do, and I am very sympathetic to the plight of the police in this,” he said.

As for root causes, Paul listed some ideas of his own.

“There are so many things we can talk about,” the senator said, “the breakdown of the family structure, the lack of fathers, the lack of a moral code in our society.”

Lack of fathers, indeed.

Image via WKYT

Contact the author at erin@jezebel.com.

This Saturday, an Army veteran in Athens, Georgia smashed the window of a hot car to free a dog in distress and was subsequently arrested for criminal trespassing, The NY Daily News reports.

According to police, the animal’s owner was furious Desert Storm veteran Michael Hammons had broken the window of her Mustang and demanded he be charged.

“We didn’t want to charge him,” Chief Deputy Lee Weems told WAGA-TV, “but he told us he broke the windows and when you have a victim there saying she wants him charged, we had no other choice.”

Hammons was then arrested and the dog’s owner was issued a citation by animal control.

According to The Associated Press, Georgia state law allows bystanders to break windows to rescue children in distress but not pets. Nevertheless, Hammons says he would do it all again.

“I knew there’d be consequences, but it didn’t matter,” he told WAGA-TV. “Glass, they make new glass every day, but they could never replace that dog.”

[Image via WXIA]

According to South Korea’s chief spy agency, the head of North Korea’s military was publicly executed by anti-aircraft gun late last month for disobeying Kim Jong Un and falling asleep during a meeting, the BBC reports.

On Wednesday morning, South Korea’s National Intelligence Service briefed lawmakers on the death of Hyon Yong-Chol, appointed as North Korea’s defense minister last year. From Reuters:

Hyon, last known to have spoken publicly at a security conference in Moscow in April, was said to have shown disrespect to Kim by dozing off at a military event, the Seoul lawmakers said, citing the agency briefing.

Hyon was believed to have voiced complaints against Kim Jong Un and had not followed his orders several times, according to the lawmakers. He was arrested late last month and executed three days later without legal proceedings, the NIS said.

Coming from secretive North Korea, there is no way to independently verify the report.

Last month, the NIS reported that Kim Jong Un had executed 15 people this year, including two vice-ministers and four members of the Unhasu orchestra. Asked about the claim by CNN, a top North Korean official dismissed the allegations as “malicious slander.”

[Image via AP Images]

Masked gunmen attacked a bus carrying Ismaili Muslims in Karachi, Pakistan early Wednesday, killing 43 people.

The bus was carrying about 60 people and was making a stop along its daily route between a gated Ismaili community and other locations in Karachi when the gunmen attacked. Police told the BBC that six gunmen, dressed as police officers, drove up on the bus on motorcycles “and fired indiscriminately at passengers.”

“As the gunmen climbed on to the bus, one of them shouted, ‘Kill them all!’” a woman injured in the attack Reuters witnessed telling a local television station.

According to the New York Times, Jundullah, a Taliban splinter group, has taken responsibility for the attack. Ismailis, a Shiite Muslim sect, and “an educated and affluent community,” are a minority group in a largely Sunni Pakistan, and have rarely been the target of terrorist groups.

Image via AP. Contact the author at aleksander@gawker.com .

Tiger Woods cheated on his ex-wife Elin Nordegren with a lot of women—we know that. But did he cheat on his recent ex-girlfriend, Lindsey Vonn, too? One of Lindsey’s “friends” says yes.

The friend tells the Daily Mail that Tiger cheated on Lindsey with a “faceless-nameless woman” after the February Farmers Insurance Open. Spooky. The friend—who really seems more like a frenemy, if we can be real—explains:

He withdrew from Farmers. You have to understand, while it’s not right, it’s not really wrong either. Tiger isn’t married. He doesn’t really drink or do drugs. So what else does he have when he can’t afford to lose again? He is allowed to find some relief.

Relief in the arms of a faceless, nameless, horrifying figure who’s haunted his dreams ever since.

Anyway, Lindsey announced her breakup with Tiger on Facebook last week. I’m sure there was some reason for it.

Photo via Getty. Contact the author at allie@gawker.com.

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I firmly believe that lube can be a wonderful addition to any person’s sex life. But picking a lube is like picking a fine wine—there are so many options, ripe for pairing with the perfect main course. Don’t just pick something random off the shelf. Here’s everything you need to know to make a smart selection.

The Basic Types of Lube

Lubes are generally categorized by their ingredients. Here are the pros and cons of each type:

• Silicone-based lubes last longest, and (in my opinion) feel the best against the skin. They’re nice and silky, without any tacky residue. Silicone-based lubes are great for anal sex, and are safe to use with latex condoms. They can also be used in water, like in the shower. The downside of being so long-lasting is that soap and water can sometimes be required to fully remove silicone-based lubes from your skin and your sheets. You should avoid using silicone lubes with silicone sex toys, as the lube can degrade the silicone in the toy. My holy grail lube is Pjur Original.
• Water-based lubes feel a little thinner and slipperier. They are extremely easy to clean up. Water-based lubes are compatible with silicone sex toys and with latex condoms. They wash away too easily to be used in the tub or shower, and they’re also not great for anal sex. Water-based lubes don’t last as long as silicone lubes, and they can feel a bit sticky, so they may require multiple applications. I recommend Wicked Aqua, which feels much more like a silicone lube than a water-based one.
• Oil-based lubes include things like coconut oil and olive oil. They can be a nice option for people who are extremely sensitive to chemicals, but they should be thoroughly washed to avoid risk of infection. Oils should also never be used with latex condoms.
• Novelty lubes can include flavored lubes, warming lubes, so-called “arousal” lubes, and desensitizing lubes. I’m not a huge fan of any of these types of lubes, as I tend to find them overly chemically and gross smelling and/or tasting, but you might find something you like.
• Natural lubes. There are a handful of products out there that use natural ingredients like Aloe Vera or Carageenan. You can also DIY your own lube.

This information should give you a good sense of the type of lube that is most compatible with your sex life. It’s usually best to make your selections based on what activities are part of your sexual repertoire.

Avoid Irritating Ingredients

In some people, lube can trigger adverse reactions like infections and skin irritations in some people. Many people are concerned with the effects of common lube ingredients like parabens and glycols, so you may want to do some research on your own before making your purchase. In general, I think it’s best to exercise more caution with lube than you would with other personal care products since you’re using it on the most sensitive part of your body. Avoid any product with perfume, mint, menthol, petroleum, glycerin, and cinnamon. Fortunately, most high quality lubes are made without these ingredients.

Try Before You Buy

Lube is such a personal preference, so it’s really helpful to get hands-on with it before forking over your dough. Your friendly local sex shop should have a variety of lubes out for sampling (on your arms, perverts!) Put a drop or two on the back of your palm, and swirl it around for a minute or two with a finger. You want it to feel soft and smooth the whole time. Try a different lube on your other hand so you can compare. Walk around the store for a few minutes, then touch your skin again. If it feels goopy or sticky, or if the product has disappeared entirely, it’s probably not a good choice.

Another fantastic option is to purchase lube trial sizes or sample packs. Most brands offer single-use trial size packs, like these from Wicked or these from Good Clean Love. Sliquid sells bundles of their most popular lubricants, so you can try out most of their line. Perhaps the most fun option is to buy a sampler pack from The Condom Review, which will allow you to try out products from a variety of brands. This particular package has some of my favorite products, and it’s currently on sale for only $7.99!

Make an Investment

You get what you pay for when it comes to lube. Sure, you can buy super cheap lubes from your local drugstore, but it’s worth spending a few extra dollars to avoid the sticky mess that is known as KY-Jelly. A little lube goes a long way, so a product that seems expensive initially shoudn’t actually cost that much per use. To get the maximum bang for your buck, you can buy lube in large quantities, like this 500ml bottle of Pjur (or you can truly go nuts with this 55-gallon, $1,300 barrel of fun).

Keep Your Options Open

There’s no need to limit yourself to just one lube, either! You might like to have a thicker lube for anal sex, but prefer a thinner one for masturbation. You could keep a bottle of silicone-based lube in your shower, and a sampler pack in your bedside table. I also like this water-based lube that’s specially formulated for use with sex toys. It’s great to have different options for different activities!

Got a couple million dollars in the bank? Want to make it rain at Christie’s? Too bad, you’re a sucker who is still too poor to buy art. Please step aside.

On Monday, a Picasso painting—Les Femmes d’Alger (Version ‘O’)—that, frankly, isn’t even that good sold to an unnamed bidder for $179 million, the most amount of money spent at auction on a work of art in history. This is no small pittance. In fact, it’s more money than I or you can ever even dream up on a good, Ambien-induced night of heavy sleep. While the name of the bidder has not been revealed, there were five bidders left when the auction reached the $120 million mark. That means there are five people who were willing to spend over $120 million on a Picasso painting.

The Upshot explored how much money one would need to purchase such a painting:

Let’s assume, for a minute, that no one would spend more than 1 percent of his total net worth on a single painting. By that reckoning, the buyer of Picasso’s 1955 “Les Femmes d’Alger (Version O)” would need to have at least $17.9 billion in total wealth. That would imply, based on the Forbes Billionaires list, that there are exactly 50 plausible buyers of the painting worldwide.

Let’s assume, for a minute, that you are insanely wealthy. Would you spend 1 percent of your net worth on a piece of artwork by some guy who doesn’t even get the respect of his own grandchildren? Maybe, maybe not.

But some people would! The Upshot gives us more to groan at:

This is meant to be illustrative, not literal. Some people are willing to spend more than 1 percent of their wealth on a painting; the casino magnate Steve Wynn told Bloomberg he bid $125 million on the Picasso this week, which amounts to 3.7 percent of his estimated net worth. The Forbes list may also have inaccuracies or be missing ultra-wealthy families that have succeeded in keeping their holdings secret.

But this crude metric does show how much the pool of potential mega-wealthy art buyers has increased since, for example, the last time this particular Picasso was auctioned, in 1997.

Some people are willing to spend more than 1 percent of their wealth on a painting, and those people are all very cool. Using the Upshot’s same equation, in 1997 for example, only a dozen richies could have afforded the painting, which means the income gap has continued to increase steadily over the past twenty years.

Fun stuff to think about.

Image via AP. Contact the author at dayna.evans@gawker.com.

NYPD officers reportedly shot a hammer-wielding man this morning in midtown Manhattan. The man, who the New York Post reports was shot in the head, allegedly tried to attack in officer with a hammer at 37th Street and 8th Ave.

No officers were injured, and the suspect was killed, according to NBC New York.

Outside our office. #NYPD - five gun shots. 37th and 8th. pic.twitter.com/miJXkFqck5

May 13, 2015

It’s unclear if this the same hammer-wielding man who attacked two women in Union Square earlier this week.

Contact the author at taylor@gawker.com.

We’ve all done stupid shit when we were kids. A marble up your nose, a toy truck in your butt—no big deal. Doctors got your back. One man, 51-year-old Steve Easton, has lived practically his whole life with a piece of a toy dart in his nose and only now did he learn about it. What a fun surprise!

Easton spoke with The Guardian about a sneezing fit that he endured recently that dislodged the sucker of a toy dart from his nasal cavity, the very same sucker he’d shoved up his nose as a seven-year-old. The sucker, which was the size of a “penny coin,” had been lodged up there for nearly his whole life until he sneezed it out onto his computer at his home in Surrey, England. From The Guardian:

Easton has suffered from the sniffles all his life but as far as he is aware the sucker has caused him no other health issues.

“I brought it up with my doctor and he was amazed like everybody else but said there had been no harm done. It’s just one of those things,” he said. “It had been there in my nasal cavity for 44 years. I was completely unaware that it was in my nose for that long. I feel no different now. I wonder if there’s anything else up there.”

His parents had apparently taken him to the hospital when he was seven but the doctors didn’t find anything, even though his parents had noticed that the rubber tip was missing from the dart.

While we are happy for Easton and his new access to proper breathing patterns, the fact that this story has no photo to show what the sucker looked like after stewing in his nose juices for forty-four years is a huge and egregious oversight.

Image via The Guardian. Contact the author at dayna.evans@gawker.com.